10 Personas - to help you understand the behaviour and motives of the Social Media Users Social Media Afternoon – Brussels, July 9 th , 2009 Ingrid Rennoir - Strategy Consultant

Part 1 What?

What? Social media users have personalities that come out in how they relate to and use social media.

What? Social media users have personalities that come out in how they relate to and use social media. Users are people…

What? And people have: motivations and intentions habits and expectations anticipation of the behavior and interests of others …

And people have:

motivations and intentions

habits and expectations

anticipation of the behavior and interests of others

…

What? So if we want to build efficient Social Media Sites, we need to get a deep perspective on the mediated social interactions, communication, actions, and behaviors of its users.

What? So if we want to build efficient Social Media Sites, we need to get a deep perspective on the mediated social interactions, communication, actions, and behaviors of its users. Personas will help us visualize this perspective!

What? What is a persona?

What? What is a persona? A persona is a fictional person who represents an user group for your site.

What? What is a persona? A persona is a fictional person who represents an user group for your site.

What? How is the data collected? By analyzing what we’ve learned about your users from user research, including: Contextual Interviews Individual Interviews Surveys (Online) Focus Groups Usability Testing

How is the data collected?

By analyzing what we’ve learned about your users from user research, including:

Contextual Interviews

Individual Interviews

Surveys (Online)

Focus Groups

Usability Testing

Part 2 Why?

Why? Reason #1 We want to know who the user is, what he does and why.

Why? Reason #2 The diversity of social media applications available attracts different kinds of users, engaging them in different kinds of activities and practices.

Why? Reason #3 The medium provides opportunities to engage users directly and through the activities in which they are engaged.

Why? Reason #4 Personas subdivide audiences into groups according to what they do and why they do it — not only what they mean, how much they earn, or how they consume.

Why? Reason #5 With personas we can migrate from page-based, contextual, and search- based advertising to user-targeted advertising.

Why? Reason #6 Personas help us to know who the user is, how to reach him/her, and how s/he influences others.

Why? Users needs Business objectives Value

Why? Users needs Business objectives Value = Efficient Social Media Sites

Why? Users needs Business objectives Value = Efficient Social Media Sites = More ROI

Part 3 The 10 personas

The personas Status seeker Critic Socializer Em-cee Lurker Buddy Harmonizer Creator Rebel Pundit

The personas: Status Seeker Personality characteristic: He believes visible accomplishments make a good impression and are socially recognised. Relationships can be understood in terms of exchange, trade and collecting. Status Seeker

The personas: Status Seeker Interests & behavior: He checks his owns stats as wel as leaderboards. He accumulates friends, symbolic tokens and other social status symbols Status Seeker

The personas: Critic Personality characteristic: A writer and an author , interested in substance and content. He may see in audience approval a measure of his insights or intelligence, rather than popularity or status. Critic

The personas: Critic Interests & behavior: He is an important contributor, blogger, commenter. He takes a committed interest in online discussions or publications. Critic

The personas: Socializer Personality characteristic: He believes in online community, using it to keep informed about friends, events and social news. He pays attention when invited and notified and accepts to be a (active) member of an online community Socializer

The personas: Socializer Interests & behavior: He wants to have fun when networking and can thus be an engine for social interaction. He participates in ratings, votings and respects the social conventions and etiquette. Socializer

The personas: Em-Cee Personality characteristic: He uses his performance to get attention and may therefore be more interested in capturing an audience than in the contents. Social validation is important. Em-Cee

The personas: Em-Cee Interests & behavior: He attracts audiences and helps to create a center of activity on UGC platforms. He is interested in tools that allow him to broadcast his postings i.e. RSS, blogs, twitter… Em-Cee

The personas: Lurker Personality characteristic: He doesn’t draw much attention but is an observant participant. He logs into site, browses, subscribes and follows others. Lurker

The personas: Lurker Interests & behavior: He generates a lot of page views as a more passive user. He may have concerns about security and privacy, but once these issues are properly addressed, he represent a large market. Lurker

The personas: Buddy Personality characteristic: He has a strong sense of friendship and sees online activities as a vehicle for maintaining relationships. Buddy

The personas: Buddy Interests & behavior: He joins social media because his friends are there. The distribution of promotional messages using friend networks may be successful. Buddy

The personas: Creator Personality characteristic: He creates, builds, makes and publishes. He provides contents that will be shared and or mashed up. Creator

The personas: Creator Interests & behavior: He is an early adopter of new trends and tools. He may invest time and energy in collaborative creative efforts. Creator

The personas: Rebel Personality characteristic: He is a frequent heckler and when annoyed he might identify himself as being in the opposition. He will focus more on content or on a group. Rebel

The personas: Rebel Interests & behavior: He is subversive and may use Social Media to distribute opinions on commercial organizations. His opinions drive indirect traffic to the places where his opinions are aired. Rebel

The personas: Pundit Personality characteristic: He considers himself as an industry leader or an expert, and routinely offers latest news, opinions and observations. He is a contributor and can capture the interest of an audience. Pundit

The personas: Pundit Interests & behavior: He plays an important role in make the web as the fastest source of news. He helps to validate the claims of net journalists and bloggers. Pundit

The personas: Harmonizer Personality characteristic: He appreciates group membership motivated by the group’s relationships. He may do things to make others happy, particularly if it serves the group’s activity. Harmonizer

The personas: Harmonizer Interests & behavior: He is sensitive to group participation and engagement. He uses a range of communication tools and applications, especiallly when it is group-oriented. Harmonizer

Part 4 How?

How? #1 By adapting the task flows to the mental processes of the user Proposed flow

How? #1 By adapting the task flows to the mental processes of the user Critic Proposed flow

How? #1 By adapting the task flows to the mental processes of the user Critic Proposed flow Optimized flow

How? #2 By adapting the content & functions of the pages to the interests, needs & behavior of the user Page prototype

How? #2 By adapting the content & functions of the pages to the interests, needs & behavior of the user Critic Em-cee Page prototype

How? Critic Em-cee Page prototype #2 By adapting the content & functions of the pages to the interests, needs & behavior of the user

How? Critic Em-cee Page prototype Page design #2 By adapting the content & functions of the pages to the interests, needs & behavior of the user

How? #3 By developing efficient Profile Funnels in your WA tool. } }

Part 5 Next steps

The next steps Match your personas with your segmentation Cross-check with the level of participation they are open to get an overview of population vs opportunity Create an approach on how to engage them in Social Media, Apply this scheme also to potential customers BUT Don’t forget the traditional communication methods Don’t loose track of you objectives, Social Media is not about playing along or being at the forefront of technology

Match your personas with your segmentation

Cross-check with the level of participation they are open to get an overview of population vs opportunity

Create an approach on how to engage them in Social Media,

Apply this scheme also to potential customers

BUT

Don’t forget the traditional communication methods

Don’t loose track of you objectives, Social Media is not about playing along or being at the forefront of technology

Thank You! LBi Belgium Vorstlaan 191 Bd du Souverain B-1140 Brussels Kortrijksesteenweg 1144 bus n B-9051 Sint-Denijs-Westrem www.lbigroup.be www.twitter.com/LBi_Belgium